


The New Emperor's Nohecharis

by Trismegistus (Lebateleur)



Category: The Goblin Emperor - Katherine Addison
Genre: Deret Beshelar is the man, Gen, Loyalty, Missing Scene, Nohecharei, Untheileneise Guard, Worldbuilding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-20
Updated: 2016-09-20
Packaged: 2018-08-16 05:38:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 963
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8089264
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lebateleur/pseuds/Trismegistus
Summary: When the new emperor arrives at court, Captain Orthema must appoint his nohecharei.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Serenade](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Serenade/gifts).



“Lieutenant Deret Beshelar reporting, sir.”

Verer Orthema looked up from the field dispatch to find Beshelar standing at perfect attention before him, and did not know whether to feel relieved or irritated. The lieutenant's squadron would have only just finished its afternoon drill on the parade grounds; he had therefore not expected the lieutenant's arrival for some time. Yet here the young man stood, with not even a scuff on one of his boots to indicate that he had been marching in formation not twenty minutes previously, and when Orthema knew only too well that Beshelar would have worked himself into a lather by the end of it.

He was likely one of the only men to have done so. To a man, the members of the Untheileneise Guard executed their duties with precision. They did so because as the second or third sons of noble households, they were expected to conduct themselves with excellence in whatever they did, be it mustering to duty or dressing in the very latest civilian fashions when at liberty. Orthema could hardly fault them for it, but veteran that he was, he knew what a far cry precision was from true martial aptitude.

Orthema thought Beshelar might actually possess something of the latter, difficult though it was to judge in an organization that by design would never see battlefield action. Drills, formation, classroom study of military philosphy: Beshelar applied himself to all of it with a seriousness of purpose Orthema had initially mistaken for facetiousness. Only when he saw how it made Beshelar the odd-man-out among his fellow cadets had he realized that the lieutenant was in deadly earnest.

It engendered within him something of a fellow feeling for Beshelar; he too was an outsider. Unlike the men he commanded, Orthema had neither court connections nor any particular cachet within Cetheise society, having rather enlisted in one of the eastern regiments with the dual intention of killing barbarians and supporting a large and impoverished rural family, and then slowly worked his way up through the ranks over the course of decades. Thus he had served until a stubbornly septic wound and political pressure to make room for younger, better connected officers to assume command conspired to drive him out, with his current position offered to him by way of consolation. 

On the whole, he had done rather well in the end: he led a life of material ease the likes of which his younger self could not have begun to imagine, and with a beautiful young bride at his side. It made the lieutenant all the more undeserving of what he was about to do to him.

Orthema came back to himself with a jolt. He had been lost in thought for some time, throughout which Lieutenant Beshelar had stood at perfect attention without so much as politely clearing his throat, or even shifting his weight from one foot to the other. 

He looked Beshelar full in the face, and spoke. “You will have heard, of course, that the emperor arrived in the capital this morning aboard the _Radiance of Cairado_. We are assigning you as his first nohecharis.”

Beshelar's ears went flat against his head, and the blood rushed to his face and then drained from it entirely. That much Orthema had anticipated, but he was wholly unprepared for how quickly the lieutenant got himself back under control. 

“Sir, yes sir,” he barked, then snapped a formal salute that would have made Orthema's old, battle-ragged drill instructor weep for joy. Orthema suddenly found himself wrong-footed, uncertain how to proceed in the face of Beshelar's unqualified acceptance of the order.

Working to hide his own confusion, he asked carefully, “Is there anything you wish to say, Lieutenant?” 

“We are honored to be called upon to serve our emperor,” said Beshelar without any hesitation.

 _Dammit, boy_ , Orthema thought. _We like you. Give us some reason to rescind our command_. 

But the lieutenant merely stood at attention, waiting for Orthema to either say something more or dismiss him. He sighed heavily, removed the sun mask and stared Beshelar in the eye. “And do you understand why the other members of the Guard were not so honored?” Although far from disreputable, no one would ever number the Beshelada among the noble houses, of whose scions the Untheileneise Guard was almost entirely composed.

“Because it is a death sentence, sir.” Spoken with the same aplomb as if he were answering any routine question from a senior officer. Orthema had half-hoped the lieutenant would say that it was due to his superior knowledge of military science, or because the other candidates owed their commissions to privilege and not effort, at which point he could have dismissed him for insubordination and chosen someone else. 

But Beshelar stayed as true to his principles as ever and would thus, Orthema thought grimly, deprive the Guard of one of its few true soldiers. For it _was_ a death sentence, to serve under this particular emperor: Varenechibel's half-goblin son, despised by his father and with no allies or advocates in court, who had never set foot in the capital and who was quite possibly mad as well. He would be dethroned or dead before Winternight, and everyone in Cetho knew it. Only his nohecharei stood between the new emperor and what was otherwise a foregone conclusion.

“Permission to speak, sir?”

Orthema inclined his head. “We grant it.”

“We believe in doing what is necessary and correct at all times, sir. We believe it is how order is upheld and how one's purpose and and worth are determined.”

“Thank you, Lieutenant,” Orthema said at last. “We believe the emperor awaits you in the Tortoise Room.”

“Sir,” said Lieutenant Beshelar and, saluting smartly, dismissed himself to report for duty.

**Author's Note:**

> I loved everything about your nohecharei worldbuilding prompt. This is how I imagine that at least one of them was chosen.


End file.
